Home: The eternal journey between international recognition and national identity

Source: The Balfour Declaration: A defining moment on the path to a home

His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

(The Balfour Declaration, November 2, 1917)

Explanation: Background and circumstances: When the world recognized our right to a home

The Balfour Declaration was one of the most important achievements in the history of the Zionist movement, establishing international recognition that the Jewish people are entitled to a national home in the Land of Israel. Following appeals by Dr. Chaim Weizmann and Nahum Sokolow, president of the World Zionist Organization, to British Prime Minister David Lloyd George and Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour, the two statesmen viewed the return of the Jewish people to their land as a theological-historical event ordained by the Creator, and thus the declaration was signed. The declaration was endorsed by the governments of the United States, France, and Italy, and was ultimately ratified by the League of Nations at the San Remo Conference.

Perspective: Between Cyrus and Balfour: Historical parallels of return

2,455 years before the Balfour Declaration, a similar proclamation was signed for the Jews of the Persian Empire, who were invited to rebuild Yehud Medinata (the province of Judah) and build the Temple. Like the Balfour Declaration, Cyrus's proclamation did not guarantee sovereignty over the Land of Israel, nor did it recognize the Zionist entity as a political body. Cyrus and Balfour offered a very partial proposal: the rebuilding of a Temple and national-cultural autonomy, or the establishment of a 'national home' in the Land of Israel, without exclusive claim over the land itself and without a commitment to full self-rule. In both cases, many Jews attempted to disrupt and undo the declaration—anti-Zionist Haredi Jews and assimilationist Jews in the case of the Balfour Declaration, and with Cyrus's proclamation, the Samaritans who feared a Jewish majority, as well as Babylonian Jews, only few of whom made the journey to the land, mostly the poor and statusless. And yet, the Second Temple period moved the Jew from temple to house of study and profoundly transformed the people of Israel, just as Zionism and the founding of the State of Israel brought about a revolution in the history of the nation and the Torah.

Going Deeper: On the meaning of recognition: Between sovereignty and sanctity

One expression of sovereignty is international recognition of a state's existence, yet recognition is not essential for a state to exist. The first 'Jewish home' established—that of Joshua and the people of Israel at the end of the journey from Egypt—was recognized only by God and the people, without international recognition, whereas the Second Temple and modern Israel's rebirth were recognized by the world. The Jewish Sages determined (Tractate Megillah 10a) that with the destruction of the First Temple and Israel's exile, the sanctity of the Land lapsed, whereas after the destruction of the Second Temple, the sanctity remained. And so Rabbi Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller explains (Tosafot Yom Tov, Tractate Eduyot 8:6): in the First Temple era there was conquest without international recognition, whereas in the Second Temple era there was international recognition, which can never be annulled.

Culture: Longing and critique: Home in the mirror of Israeli culture

In 1989, Chava Alberstein released an album titled London. The title track, "London," included the following lines:

Goodbye

I'm leaving

I don't want

You to walk me any further

Not that I have any illusions

About London

London isn't waiting for me

There too I'll be alone

The song was received by the public as a call to leave the country, and several broadcast networks refused to air it. Many remember the words of the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin on the eve of Independence Day 1976, calling those who emigrate from Israel a "fallout of weaklings," and to this day leaving the country is perceived by many as failure and moral weakness, a blow to our national home. Six years later, Alberstein wrote another song:

They announced the plane has landed

In a moment I'll see my son

Here he is, here he is

Here he comes

I didn't make it abroad, Mom

I didn't make money, I didn't find happiness

I didn't have fun, I didn't get ahead, Mom

I didn't marry, I didn't get engaged

And I didn't meet anyone

I didn't make it abroad, Mom

I didn't buy a thing and I brought nothing back

I didn't make it abroad, Mom

I didn't make money, I didn't find happiness

For more, see the National Library magazine, The Librarians:

https://blog.nli.org.il/hanoch-levin/